Skagit County freelance journalist and blogger Joe Kunzler agrees with many of right-wing podcaster Brandi Kruse’s views. In fact, he plans to vote for three initiative measures that Kruse strongly supports—revoking a new millionaires income tax, banning transgender girls from girls’ sports, and modifying some student privacy rights.
But Kunzler is disturbed by Kruse’s strong alliances with some conservative political interests while simultaneously claiming to be a member of the press. He’s filed a complaint with Washington’s Public Disclosure Commission (PDC), which regulates political finances in Washington, to request that it determine whether Kruse should be considered a grassroots lobbyist.
Many of Kunzler’s concerns have been raised by other parties—Kruse leading political rallies, her paid speeches at GOP functions, and her coziness with Let’s Go Washington, the political action committee responsible for the conservative statewide initiatives on November’s ballot. However, the potential lobbyist aspect is a previously unreported wrinkle.
According to the PDC, “direct lobbying” consists of dealing directly with legislators and government officials to influence state laws and policies. “Grassroots lobbying” consists of approaching the public to influence state laws and policies. People who lobby the Legislature for money, or possibly reimbursed travel, or have compiled lobby-related expenses must register with the PDC as a lobbyist.
The PDC’s disclosure requirements say: “Any person or entity making grassroots lobbying expenditures exceeding $1,500 in the aggregate in a one-month period or exceeding $3,000 in the aggregate in any three-month period must register as a sponsor of a grassroots lobbying campaign.”
Kunzler filed his complaint last March, and the PDC began its investigation in July. Kunzler’s complaint has been lost among higher-profile claims and counterclaims swirling about Kruse, who occupies a hazy spot in the Puget Sound media universe because she wears multiple press and political hats.
Kunzler’s complaint zeroes in on whether Kruse could be considered a lobbyist. “That should be part of the decision: Is she a lobbyist or not?” he said in an interview.
He alleges that Kruse—who is a leader of the movement to ban trans girls from girls’ sports—constantly switches roles to become whatever she needs to be.
“Brandi wants to be treated as a journalist when it benefits her. An activist when it benefits her. … Commercial media business, when she sells ads. A victim when somebody scrutinizes those ads. She wants all the benefits of influence and none of the accountability that comes with that influence. Sorry, that’s not how this works. If you build a platform around politics, you’re selling advertising, hosting events, appearing at rallies … you do not get to act shocked when someone asks whether disclosure laws apply to you,” he wrote in his complaint.
Illustrating Kunzler’s point, Kruse further clouded up the debate on if she is a journalist or activist last Friday at a Portland Thorns soccer match.
She helped lead a political stunt in which roughly 20 people wore XX/XY shirts—signifying opposition to transgender girls in girls’ sports—to the game, with the shirts deliberately hidden beneath coats. Then everyone took off their coats at halftime to display their XX/XY shirts.
OutKick columnist Matt Calkins had stationed himself nearby to cover the stunt. Calkins resigned from the Seattle Times in August over a spiked column about girl athletes wanting trans girls out of their sports.
The XX/XY reveal sparked an angry confrontation from trans-friendly Thorns fans, which was covered by Calkins
and Kruse. The arena’s security escorted Kruse and the rest of her group out to the street. Fox News reported Sunday that the US Department of Justice is investigating the incident.
“I wanna do my show. I’m not an activist,” Kruse said in a Saturday podcast about the confrontation.
The National Women’s Soccer League, including the Thorns, does not have an openly transgender player and doesn’t have a policy on trans players. Unlike in Washington, there is no anti-trans sports measure on Oregon’s ballot this November.
On Twitter Sunday, Kruse accused the crowd members that confronted her group of belonging to two Portland sports booster organizations that have ties to Antifa.
Meanwhile, Kruse declined to comment on Kunzler’s complaint to the PDC.
“I am not interested in participating in your breathless reporting about unfounded allegations against me. I’m sure The Stranger gets a lot of clicks when my name is in the headline,” she wrote in an email.
Last month, the PDC dismissed charges in an unrelated complaint that Kruse provided in-kind political donations to the three Let’s Go Washington ballot initiatives.
Months ago, Kruse and two right-wing allies filed a federal lawsuit against the Washington House clerk’s office and the Capitol Correspondents Association for denying the trio press passes to the Democratic side of the House chamber in Olympia because they are active in Republican political causes—sometimes for pay. Kruse despises the Olympia press corps, twice calling those reporters “enemies of the people” on her podcast.
The Capitol Correspondents Association recently dropped its opposition to granting them press passes, and the three dropped their suit against that group. Litigation is still in play against the House clerk’s office, with the judge voicing doubts that the plaintiffs will prevail.
Meanwhile, 570 KVI AM talk radio host Ari Hoffman, a Kruse ally and a plaintiff in the press pass litigation, has filed two PDC complaints against the Seattle Times, alleging that since private donations help fund its climate change and homelessness coverage, the newspaper is violating political finance laws, which should lead to denial of its Olympia press passes. Kruse has threatened similar complaints against other media entities, but has not followed through.
Kunzler noted Kruse has close relationships with Project 42 and its subsidiary Future 42, which is a daily advertiser on her podcast. Project 42’s leaders include Brian Heywood and Steve Gordon, who are also leaders of Let’s Go Washington, which has set up and financially backed seven public ballot measures for Washington voters since 2024. Their track record at the ballot box is three failed, one passed but later declared invalid, and three to be determined on Nov. 3.
Kruse is an “ambassador” for Future 42. Kunzler wants clarification on what that legally means. “Her ambassadorship raises lots of questions,” he said. The PDC is studying this same issue. Kunzler is suspicious about Kruse and Future 42 being in lockstep on most, if not all, political matters, and wants the PDC to examine that relationship.
In 2024 interviews, Kruse and Project 42 said they drifted together because of their similar political beliefs.
Kunzler also pointed to 2025 photographs of Kruse and Hoffman talking to GOP legislators in the House
Republican caucus room. Reporters and the public are not allowed in either party’s caucus meetings.
However, House GOP caucus chairman Peter Abbarno of Centralia said House Republicans routinely bring in people prior to caucus meetings to talk about their roles and what they do on their jobs—and this was one of those occasions. Other pre-caucus-meeting guest speakers include at least two mainstream media reporters plus Democratic Attorney General Nick Brown, he said.
“I do not want lobbyists with more access to state legislators,” Kunzler said.
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